Through sheer luck, New Zealanders live in the freest country on Earth. We’re afforded the freedom to be ourselves - to say what we’re thinking, wear what we want, choose our own friends – freedoms we take for granted.

In a country as fortunate as ours, Amnesty International is a movement supported by only a small few.

To increase awareness and support of their work by engaging as many people as possible, we needed a tangible and relevant way of bringing Amnesty’s message home to all New Zealanders through experiencing first hand what it might be like to live without basic human rights.

We needed to find a way of making everyday Kiwis understand the important work that Amnesty International does as a global movement standing up for human rights.

We turned to Facebook as the place where so many of us freely express ourselves and share our lives. Tapping into users' Facebook profiles, we were able to create a personally relevant experience of how human rights are affected in other parts of the world and, therefore, how important the work of Amnesty International is to all humans.

Our solution was Trial by Timeline: a Facebook application that scans your Facebook Timeline activity and shows you what your behaviour would have cost you around the world, just for being you. It searches for everything you’ve ever liked, posted or written. It studies your personal profile, your age, nationality, relationship status and political views and sentences you to real punishments.

Finally, it asks you to use your freedom to help free others by showing your support to Amnesty International.

Our New Zealand project is in its infancy, but has already gathered global traction. Daily visits have topped 15,000 and over 135 countries have taken part. Amnesty sections in Sweden, Turkey, South Korea, Denmark and Norway have requested translations of the software.

Closer to home, Trial by Timeline has received coverage across national media channels, trended on Twitter and been shared and advocated by local celebrities and influential bloggers.